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This website covers knowledge management, personal effectiveness, theory of constraints, amongst other topics. Opinions expressed here are strictly those of the owner, Jack Vinson, and those of the commenters.

From Patrick's article, I liked the bullseye drawing that suggests many different ways to look at "culture" with the center being more stable and (probably) difficult to change. The graphic is his too, in case the formatting doesn't make that clear.

The diagram on the right is a simplified version of various theorists' views of what culture is (have a look at Trompenaars, Hofstede, Adler and others). It suggests that culture exists and operates at various levels. What's important in relation to social media is that, for example, an organisation can try to cultivate norms and behaviour in terms of social learning, and put in place the infrastructure to do so (i.e. the signs and symbols level); but if the fundamental beliefs in the organisation don't actively encourage social learning, it's all pointless.

I really like this last point. If the fundamental beliefs are out of line with the desired change, you are in for a real challenge. It isn't completely hopeless, but you have to be willing to dig a little deeper with your implementation. Specifically, how does The Change (whether it is a new software or new organizational structure or ...) relate to the core beliefs and values of the organization - of the people that form the organization? What do you need to modify about The Change to align better with those core beliefs? How can you modify the outer rings to align better with The Change?

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This blog is about knowledge management, personal effectiveness, theory of constraints and other topics. Opinions expressed here are strictly those of the owner, Jack Vinson, and those of the commenters.